Super Bowl XLVI: Commercial Success?

For football fans out there Super Bowl XLVI means mile-high kicks, cringe-inducing sprints toward the goal line, and game-changing interceptions. For the rest of us, it means commercials… and hopefully chili.

Known for it’s wide appeal and massive audience, the annual Superbowl broadcast tends to attract the cream of the product-hawking crop. It’s become so renowned that there’s almost an unspoken competition among companies to air the commercial everyone will be chatting about long after the stadium has emptied and the players have taken off their armor… er, padding. With 30 seconds of air time costing roughly $3.5 million, hopefully this year will not disappoint, and maybe it will even step up where last year left room for improvement- (insert joke about Kim Kardashian selling more than just Skechers here).

So, if you’re like me and are more jazzed about decorating chocolate covered strawberries to look like mini-footballs than about the big game, here is a list of some hotly anticipated things to look forward to when the ole’ pig skin is taking a breather:

1. Continuation of Volkswagen’s doggy Star Wars commercials… let’s hope the force is strong with them.

 

2. A new trailer for Joss Whedon’s superhero epic The Avengers. Watch for the PopMatters Joss Whedon book in stores when the movie opens. Click here to view the stars collide in this short the new trailer.

 

3. Matthew Broderick spoofing his Ferris Bueller character in an ad for Honda’s new CR-V. See if you can spot all the references to the original movie here — there are over two dozen.

 

4. The winner of Doritos’ “Crash the Super Bowl” competition, a contest where fans create their own commercials and vote on which one should air during game time. Click here to check out the finalists.

 

5. Kim Kardashian’s replacement “Mr. Quiggly”, a pug trying to gain the strength he needs to out-pace greyhounds in this Skechers series. Check out the preview for the series here.

 

6. The eternally young E*Trade Baby giving sage advice to various people during defining moments in their lives. Check out his best man wisdom here.